It was good to get out of California, so good that the first opportunity we had, we drove back into California! Have to see more big trees. On the advice of a park ranger, we took a drive down Howland Hill Road. This is a narrow dirt road with a maximum speed of about 10, right down in the trees of Redwood National/State Park. We stopped and took a small hike through the forest. We wanted to add a short video clip of our drive through the trees, but this trip journal website limits us to 16 mb of video. That might be one or two seconds! The...

It is hard to believe I have been on the road for a month, and that tomorrow I will arrive at Crater Lake.
I have seen much and yet have left much to be seen “next time”, whether or not that time ever comes. It is a nice way to feel about the things that don’t quite get accomplished on any trip or any day. Like Scarlet, I’ll think about that tomorrow.
But first….today. Unlike yesterday, I woke early. I think that was partly because I was a little achy from my hike. Besides that it was Bill’s Birthday, it was my last day before reaching...

When I woke this morning it was 8:30 Pacific time. I was so shocked I double checked to make sure my phone was not on the wrong time zone!
I stopped in town to load the journal entry from the last couple days, then had some difficulty finding the trailhead. Because I was already running later than expected, I decided to do a different hike and maybe (if I set my alarm!) will do the Flint Ridge hike tomorrow. Or not. There is softball at 4 and I want to be clean...so maybe I will save that hike for the next time.
Today was 9 miles through...

Sorry about the days without entries.
San Francisco was fabulous and sure enough, we had a busy final day. After playing with Stella in the park, we had a long walk to REI where I bought a couple of silk base layer shirts in case I need something warm under my uniform this summer. I hear there is still a lot of snow at Crater Lake and after a few chilly days in San Francisco, an extra layer sounded like a good plan.
I have a cousin who moved to San Francisco in 1990. He just happened to have a friend going that way so caught a ride and...

The national park system is celebrating its 100th birthday this year and we are celebrating along with them. A few weeks ago we enjoyed the huge trees in Sequoia National Park and today we visited their cousins at Redwood National Park, a park we have never seen. The sequoia are the biggest trees in the world; the redwoods are the tallest trees in the world. Think elephant and giraffe. The redwood are a close match to trees found in fossil layers alongside dinosaur skeletons. Unmolested the sequoia have a longer life span than the redwoods...

The Redwood National and State Parks (RNSP) are located along the coast of northern California. Comprising Redwood National Park and California's Del Norte Coast, Jedediah Smith, and Prairie Creek Redwoods State Parks, the combined RNSP contain 133,000 acres. The four parks, together, protect 45% of all remaining coast redwood (Sequoia sempervirens) old-growth forests, totaling at least 38,982 acres. These trees are the tallest and one of the most massive tree species on Earth.
In 1850, old-growth redwood forest covered more than 2,000,000...

We had a pretty adventurous day today. We drove the Newton-Drury Scenic Byway through the Redwood Forest, stopping to do some interesting hikes which involved climbing over, under and even through the huge trees. The path we took followed a stream and at some points we had to walk in the stream. Then we took a drive down a dirt road and through several stream crossings to get out to the coast. There we saw a family of four elk just hanging out in a campground on the beach. We drove right by them and they didn’t even seem to mind us being...

We saw more beautiful coast before we got to the California Redwood National Park. The redwoods were fantastic and the park was easy to explore except that we did get lost for awhile. The park is not commercialized at all. The redwoods in the park are unbelievable. How surreal to be walking through a forest that has been there for 2000 years! Awesome.

Today’s adventure is taking us to the Redwood National and State Park (RNSP) located along the coast of northern California. The weather was wonderful and temps weren’t too high when we started off a little before 9:00 taking the scenic Hwy 199 to Crescent City. Just as we reached the Oregon coast we couldn’t believe it; FOG! Oh no, another trip ruined by coastal fog?
Our first stop was to check out the Battery Point Lighthouse west of the middle of downtown Crescent City. There’s a causeway for folks to access from the city to the...

After being gone from home state for over a month, it seems like just yesterday that we left. I am so tired of cloudy that hot is starting to sound good. Yikes! We finished our drive along the Oregon coast and re-entered California as the clouds were returning inland and the fog was again blanketing the area.
We began our day in the private camping space we had secured the night before and made our way to Oregon Dunes National Recreation area. We were the only tourists there at that moment so we got a private ranger led guided tour for the...

Today was a surprise. It was hard to be amazed after the Sequoias! We headed out a bit late and wound our way south through some of the park with some side hikes (see big trees- though they were everywhere). THen we went back north and went to the drive through tree (for cars- not big RVs!) and saw some emu creatures. Then we drove and drove, stopping at the Crescent Beach area for awhile before finally arriving in Ashland Oregon- we go rafting in the morning! Btu tonight we had a swim, spun on the merry go round and had some good grilled...